So I’ve come to the point where I’ve lost my already non-existent patience. It’s absolutely gone, I tell you. With the wind, down the drain, up in flames. Because it’s been a solid hour, for fuck’s sake. Enough of this silent suffering.

No answer. Oh for Merlin’s sake, it was almost 7.30 am by now, not that early.

“Please, help. Anyone? I’m stuck …. I’m stuck in the stairs!”

Shouting it out loud made it sound even more ridiculous.

I’ve been stuck in the stairs for over an hour.

I knew so for a fact, as I left Ravenclaw tower at 6.05, so I could start my daily morning exercises on the grounds outside precisely at 6.15. Somewhere around 6.11 however, dearest Hogwarts castle decided it couldn’t quite handle students out of bed before the break of dawn.

So the Merlin-damn stairs swallowed my lower left legon the way down.

And here I thought I was getting the hang of navigating through this magical labyrinth that calls itself a school. I was rubbing my eyes in utter frustration, when my trained ears suddenly picked up the sound of footsteps approaching from behind. I swivelled as best as possible, without breaking my leg that is, then jumped for joy when I recognized the lanky thirteen-year-old boy coming down. Well, figuratively speaking of course. Actually jumping wasn’t in the cards for me at the moment.

“I thought I recognized your voice. Find yourself in a bit of a pickle, E?” he said mockingly, dressed in Quidditch gear, a broom casually swung over his shoulder.

“Oi, don’t go shouting about my middle name!” he answered, looking around as if to check no one else caught the name of our shared but long deceased grandmother.

“Whatever you say, Jeanine, just get me out of this death trap.”

“Of course, Elisa dearest. You just, ah…, have to very kindly ask the stairs to release you.”

“Ask the stairs?” I narrowed my eyes at Max, not trusting his suddenly sugary sweet tone.

“Beg the stairs, in fact”, he replied smoothly.

“Beg the … . Alright then, I guess…”

I didn’t quite trust the oddly solemn expression on Max’s face, but how many alternatives did I have? Exactly. Naught. Besides, in a castle where you tickle a pear to gain access to the kitchens, staircases change directions ad hoc, and the Headmistress changes into a striped cat now and then, asking the stairs for permission to be released, doesn’t sound as ridiculous as it does at first.

“Dear stairs,” I started uncertainly, “this past hour has been a blast, truly. Nowhere I’d rather be. But will you please let go of me? We could do this again next week if you’d like, but for now let’s part ways. Please let go, pretty please?”

Nothing. So I continued.

“I could sing ‘Stairway to heaven’ for you, would that help change your mind? My voice is rather disagreeable, as you’ll unfortunately find. But it’s a nice song, don’t you think? Very appropriate, too.”

“You’re a right git, you know that Jeanine?” I spat, suppressing the urge to join in with Max’s giggles.

“Alright, alright, you’ve had your laugh. Now please just help me!”

Still hiccupping, he set aside his broomstick and grabbed me by my armpits, pulling forcibly. My left shin appeared from the depths of the marble step, which I’ll be avoiding at all times from now on, thank you very much, and then my ankle and trainer followed. Aha, freedom at last!

“So I was heading out for an early flying session and practice for Quidditch try-outs, and I reckon you had some insane morning workouts planned as well,” Max gestured towards my sporty outfit, “but what about skipping all that and having a humongous breakfast instead?” he then proposed, picking up his broom again.

“When it’s not fooling me into talking to stairs, I like the way your brain works, Jeanine” I easily agreed, linking my arm with his, heading down but carefully skipping that treacherous work of marble.

He wriggled free of course, then started belting the refrain from ‘Stairway to heaven’ while skipping down, only stopping when a couple of very annoyed portraits threatened to send for the school’s resident poltergeist to wreak its havoc and make him shut up.

The air surrounding him was thick with the smell of years and years of owl droppings nobody’d ever bothered to clean up, but Alex barely noticed. Instead, he stood motionless by the window, watching Cassiopeia, the Greengrass family owl, grow into a tiny speck on the horizon, which the evening sun appropriately coloured blood red. To Cassie's left claw, Alex had tied a reply to the letter he'd received this morning at breakfast. The carefully sealed piece of parchment contained precisely two words.

"Yes, father", it read, and so it sealed Alex's post-Hogwarts fate.

He had always known he was to follow in Hector Greengrass's hefty footsteps, join the various family businesses and help enlarge the already massive century-old Greengrass emporium. However, Liam, Alex's brother, had always formed somewhat of a buffer when it came to his father's incessant and not so gentle pushes towards a future in Greengrass MLtd. Whilst Alex was of course expected to join, Liam, as the eldest Greengrass child, was first in line to replace Hector when the patriarch would eventually call it quits and retire from professional life. So after graduating last June, as expected of him, Liam had immediately started training and living the office life.

Soon however, Hector had found out what Alex had already known for years. Namely, that Liam was absolutely useless, in every aspect of the word, especially when it came to running a business successfully. His extremely limited economic knowledge and absolute lack of a nose for good deals had proven to be the least of problems. It was his incurable preference of rather violent wand use above diplomatic dialogue when it came to settling disputes that had proven an insurmountable nuisance for Greengrass Senior. Hence this morning's letter to his youngest.

“Show you the ropes over Christmas …, Make sure to get O on your Arithmancy NEWT…, Don't disappoint me, son ...”

Though he had crumpled up and Incendioed the letter the minute he had finished reading it, the words were branded on Alex’s retina. Even more so was the message which had been written between the lines of his father's immaculatele handwriting. Liam was to be moved to the other, non-official, branch of Greengrass MLtd, where they could use his brute strength and impulsive behaviour. Alex on the other hand, was to be groomed to match his father's slick perfection, to ultimately take his place as number one.

Cassiopeia had altogether disappeared from view, but still Alex was staring out of the window, his eyes now fixed on another figure, a tall and slender one he recognized even from this great distance.

Elisa Thompson was running laps around the Quidditch pitch.

He hadn't spoken to her since that night in the Hospital Wing, but of course he'd seen her around. This morning for example, when he'd decided to head down early for breakfast and had spotted her and Hastings junior seated at the Ravenclaw table, in a mostly deserted Great Hall.

Whilst Cassie had delivered the equivalent to life imprisonment from his father, owl post had brought Thompson something altogether different. Several parcels and packages wrapped in brown paper. Out had come hoodies, scarves, badges and tees, all sapphire blue and bronze, embroidered with the Ravenclaw emblem. She was wearing some of the merchandize now, it would seem, as the bronze was reflecting the last of today’s rays of sun.

After what seemed like an eternity, he watched as her tiny figure finally left the Quidditch pitch, then ran straight into the Forbidden Forest.

“The fuck?!”

Was she completely bonkers? The Forest wasn’t a place for students on the brightest of days, let alone near nightfall. Had she missed that memo at the welcoming feast?

“Thompson!” he cried, “Thompson, get back!”

To no avail of course. This high up, the owls were the only ones to hear him, and they hooted and flapped their wings indignantly at his choice of decibels in their sanctuary.

“C’mon,” he muttered to himself, whilst gripping the edges of the medieval windowsill, half expecting Elisa to realize her mistake and re-emerge from the woods.

Alex cursed out loud when she didn’t, then ran down the long stone stairs of the Owlery two steps at a time, heading for the one place at Hogwarts even he evaded at all costs.

Figuring out the riddle the bronze knocker had thrown at her without thinking about it twice, Rose walked into the Ravenclaw common room rather hurriedly, pushing past some frightened-looking first years, then sprinted up the winding staircase leading towards her dormitory. Finding the circular room deserted, she threw down her bulging backpack on her bed, then stood watching it for a second, breathing heavily.

Her hands fumbled a bit, but zipping open the bag and consequently the pencil case it contained, Rose took out an exceptionally normal quill. She let it roll between her fingers, stroked its feathers, and held it up against the fading evening sunlight.

It was Scorpius’s.

Even though she didn’t spend her days in self-induced solitary confinement anymore but instead attended most of her classes, socializing and partaking in the meaningless chit chat her peers so eagerly engaged in, just seemed too trivial.

Meaning that, in a class such as Advanced Potions, which none of her many cousins was taking, she was utterly friendless.

“Just take the bloody quill, Weasley, it’s not going to bite off your fingers.”

Well, not entirely friendless. Scorpius was taking Advanced Potions, had noticed she had somehow managed to bring Hugo’s eternally spelling ‘Chudley Cannons, Chud- Chud- Chudley Cannons’ quill, instead of one of her own Self-Inking quills.

“… it’s not going to bite off your fingers”, accompanied by an eye roll and a signature smirk.

His voice resonated in her head, like that one broken Celestina Warbeck record her Gran could never grow tired of.

“Take the bloody quill, Weasley,…”

It had sounded so normal, had rolled from his lips so naturally.

“… Weasley,…”

Almost as if last June hadn’t happened. As if they were still bickering back and forth in public, but snogging each other’s brains out in private.

Last June had most definitely happened, however. A quick glance down her blouse showed the permanent reminder. Pink scar tissue, covering her entire torso. Rose let her fingers stroke the feathers one last time. She then dropped it, but pointed her wand before it could hit the dorm’s floor.

Inspiration for this chapter's song came from this Norwegian tv series I very recently discovered, called SKAM. It. Is. Literally. The. Best. Check it out if you have the time, but prepare to be hooked!

Any thoughts on this chapter or the storyline in general you'd like to share? Please do so, I'm very curious as to what you guys think :)